


Junking

by Beth Harker (Beth_Harker)



Category: Newsies (1992)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-30
Updated: 2016-12-30
Packaged: 2019-09-30 07:23:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 404
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17219489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beth_Harker/pseuds/Beth%20Harker
Summary: Blankets and Tumbler scavenge for what they can find.





	Junking

Most people wouldn’t believe that a kid like Tumbler, born and raised on the streets of Manhattan, could know a single thing about paradise, but they were wrong. Paradise was the Westside Sunday Market, at eleven o'clock at night after the vendors and the customers had gone home, leaving the streets and dumpsters littered with treasures in their wake.

Junking was a favorite pastime of the younger newsies, and Tumbler went to the market with Blankets every week. Blankets always walked just behind him, old enough and tall enough to get Tumbler almost a full block into where the market stood, though not right up to the center where only the biggest and strongest boys reigned supreme.

“Lookie here,” Tumbler waved a fish head in Blankets’ face, and the older boy laughed.

“We’ll name him Joe and throw him into a bonfire, get him cooked up real good,” Blankets promised.

“Let me know if you finds any pig feet. Those is my favorites,” Tumbler said. They were also one of the rarest finds, along with any sort of candy, which always got swept up in short order.

Within ten minutes, the two boys had come up with another four discarded fish heads, and some apples and tomatoes with a few rotten patches, but plenty of good fruit in between.

“Mush was telling me that he misses being little enough to junk,” Blankets remarked.

“Skittery was telling me he misses being little enough to go ‘round barefoot, but Race said he was full of shit.”

“Tumbler!”

“What?”

“You don’t gotta use words like that.”

Tumbler grinned, “I don’t gotta, but I can.” His tone wasn’t argumentative. Nobody was going to punish him for cursing. They just liked to remind him not to sometimes, and he supposed they meant it kindly, especially Blankets, who meant everything kindly.

Before an hour was up, Blankets and Tumbler’s junking sack was full to bursting.

“You better let me carry that,” Blankets said. “It’s heavier than you is.”

Tumbler handed the bag over to Blankets, who struggled under the weight of it, but didn’t complain.

“Let’s not invite anyone else to our bonfire,” Tumbler said. “Gotta get something out of being littler than everyone else.”

Blankets smiled. He’d managed to shift the sack to a better position across his back, and he was carrying it more easily now. “Ain’t that the truth! This feast is for the two of us.”


End file.
